A question about replicators from Star Trek
So I have been watching Star Trek DS9 lately and enjoying it in spite of it being a Rick Berman project but something keeps bothering me about it. Like any society that has effectively unlimited resources the Federation doesn’t really use currency. If you ever read any of the Culture books by Iain Banks this will make total sense to you. The use of replicators by the Federation means that anyone can effectively have any food or item they want.
In DS9 we have Quark and his bar. The entire Ferengi race is obsessed with earning gold pressed latinum. I have learned from Memory Alpha that latinum cannot be replicated…because you know, science but Quark uses replicators to create drinks all the time. Yet he is often bemoaning his low margins when he effectively pays nothing for his merchandise. Why would anyone pay Quark to get drunk when they could just replicate 800 gallons of Thunderbird in their room? At one point Quark was very much into the weapons trade and selling them by the thousands but why would anyone buy a thousand phaser rifles when you could just buy one and then replicate them by the gross? For that matter let’s say the Cardassians were about to invade Bajor. In the last hour before they landed couldn’t the Bajorian government send out a message of “Um, everyone on the planet go replicate a rifle and 200 kilos of high explosive. We are sending you the schematics right now.” Often times a Runabout is stranded for lack of a part but has a replicator. Doesn’t that imply some kind of solution?
For that matter what could Quark buy with latinum that he couldn’t just replicate? Sure there is probably some kind of status associated with wealth in Ferengi society but even so shouldn’t you just have a free beer tap pretty much anywhere? The economy of the Star Trek universe bugs me. Actually so do the Ferengi. Any Ferengi heavy episode sucks. Beer image courtesy of the funny t shirt category.
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 16 Shore Leave
I admit I loved this episode as a kid but as an adult (with body hair and everything) I now kind of think of it as fairly juveniles. When I did my list of favorite Trek episodes it didn’t even make the top 20. To be honest I have always been more inclined towards the serious and depressing episodes. They just always felt like they have more gravitas.
As an adult I also have some questions about the Omicron Delta planet. If they have to technology to take McCoy’s ripped out heart and bleeding corpse and revive him wouldn’t that make the planet the destination of every cadaver in the Federation? In fact as a doctor wouldn’t Bones have an interest in some of those techniques? Seems like a season later McCoy almost had Sarek die on the operating table. Some of the Omicronian technology might have come in handy.
For that matter how about the whole mind reading thing? Seems like this planet is a treasure trove of tech for the Federation and I probably would have strip mined it to it’s molten core. Either that or just lived there and populated the entire planet with clones of Zoe, Inara, and Kaylee from Firefly. Sorry you can’t visit. (very appropriate image courtesy of the Firefly tshirt category)
the Infamous Dave Inman
Nightcrawler Review Part 1
Something weird happened while I was watching this film. I became a Jake Gyllenhaal fan.
Not that I ever had anything against him. I have always been a big Donnie Darko fan and enjoyed him a great deal in End of Watch. Even when he does mediocre crap like Source Code I generally like his performance and of course I have had a thing for his hot sister Maggie ever since Stranger than Fiction.
However last night while watching this excellent movie I suddenly came to realize that he is a great actor and have put him on the list of with performers like Denzel Washington and Brad Pitt whom I will seek to see in any film regardless of subject matter just for their performances. If those three did a remake of Fried Green Tomatoes in drag I would check it out.
So I guess I have already given away how I feel about this film and that is that it rocked. Great story, excellent camera work, tight editing, good dialog, and above all Jake Gyllenhaal my new man crush. What was great about him? He is super, duper, uber, smuber, foober creepy and engaging in a way that only true sociopaths can be. 
His fast paced and concise monolog engaged me in a way that I can only compare to Tyler Durden delivering his destruction of modern values speeches in Fight Club or Emperor Palpatine explaining to Luke how much he failed to understand the Force in Return of the Jedi that I love so much. (retro Fett image courtesy of the my collection of Star Wars t-shirts) Plus I don’t know if it was makeup, camera work, lighting, his own face, or just emoting so great it translated into his look but Jake definitely had the insane crazy eyes going that will have you squirming in your seat.
If you look at this film as a character study of a true nut job I think you will get the most bang for your buck. He is truly out there and each scene just shows you how much out of touch with actual humanity he is. Jake has always done crazy well (i.e. Donnie Darko) but it now all previous films seem like prep work for this movie. Sorry to gush on about his performance so much but the man truly nailed this film.
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Nightcrawler Review Part 2
That is not to take away from writer/director Dan Gilroy. The script and screenplay were excellent. The direction nigh flawless. This is his first directing debut and honestly I can’t wait to see what he does next. Given the amount of raw sewage that is pumped out of Hollywood on a weekly basis it’s very refreshing to see someone with talent get his moment to shine and not blow it.
In a normal review this is where I would say something like “for all that it did have a few problems…” and then list them in detail but I honestly can’t think of one. If I were still doing the old stars/black holes system this film be one of the very rare zero black hole films. The only criticism I can offer is while I enjoyed all 117 minutes immensely I honestly don’t feel any need to go back and see it a second time. I don’t think there will be anything to gain from a second theater viewing and will be happy to watch it on a couch at movie night. I felt the same way about Argo (another film I verbally orgasmed about) whereas certain movies (Guardians of the Galaxy) keep sucking me back into the cinema.
I’d like to offer one more comment and that is how much I enjoy seeing Bill Paxton in films like this. I’m sure everyone remembers him as either Hudson from Aliens (“Game over, man! Game over!” Image courtesy of the horror movie t-shirts category) or Chet from Weird Science (“How about a nice greasy pork sandwich served in a dirty ashtray?” but I became a fan when he played Severen in the greatest vampire movie of all time, Near Dark (basically white trash vampires with guns. “I hate ’em when they ain’t been shaved.”)
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Nightcrawler Review Part 3
Story recap. Louis Bloom (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a down and out sociopath and petty thief when he comes across an accident being filmed by news stringer Joe Loder (Bill Paxton). Louis realizes there is money in it and trades a stolen bike for a camera and police scanner. He starts filming accidents and crime scenes and selling them to desperate news director Nina Romina (Rene Russo. Remember her being naked in like 50% of the Thomas Crown Affair? I sure do. She also played Frigga in Thor, which is both a great film and an awesome character name. The Norse did it right. 
Thor image from the comic book t shirts collection). He learns quickly and in short order is creating news as much as filming it. He extorts Nina into sleeping with him in a skin crawlingly creepy scene and steadily increases his skills and value to the network. He gets involved in a major crime and films all of it.
5 of 5! Excellent!
So worth seeing or not? Hell yes. You are a fool if you don’t go see this film. Every scene with Jake in it will have you glued to the screen and every scene has him in it. Date movie? In the sense of a film that will encourage your date to get naked with you no but in the sense that you care about your date and want her to see an excellent movie yes. Bathroom break? Hold it dude. This film is worthy of you wetting your pants. 5 of 5 phasers.
More to see soon but I am still working on those social commentary blogs that I think I need to share with the world. I’ll post them soon. Thank you all for reading . I hope you all have a great night.
The Infamous Dave Inman
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Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 17 the Squire of Gothos
I have to admit I love this episode. There was something about Trelane that I loved. Perhaps it was the fact that the crew of the Enterprise is always better when faced with a vastly superior adversary. Also it drives Kirk nuts when someone fails to take him seriously and that is fun to watch.
Star Trek was never above recycling props from old episodes and reusing them later on and I have to give this episode massive props (haw!) for the best reuse when they took the Buffalo costume from The Man Trap, put in on a mannequin, and put it in the corner as a stuffed trophy in Trelene’s mansion. The fact that Kirk and the others never even remarked on it is even cooler. 
Possibly the first real example of a great sci fi Easter Egg like when a Star Wars Imperial Shuttle flew over the space port in Firefly (Image from one of my personal Firefly tshirts). Perhaps they just assumed Trelene had killed a buffalo in his travels, although it later proved he had simply created it along with the rest of the planet.
Honestly the “twist” of Trelane really being a child is a little prosaic IMO. I’m sure it was mindblowing back in the day but honestly the real enjoyment of this episode is in the crew and how they deal with him.
the Infamous Dave Inman
Ouija Review Part 1
What’s better than a horror movie where lots of scary stuff happens? How about a horror movie where no scary stuff happens?
This is a film that suffered from the Curse of the X-Files. The problem the X-Files suffered from was every time you were 100% convinced you were about to see an alien, ghost, Bigfoot, or chupacabra only to have it turn out to be a cat or some damn thing. X-Files was 85% set up, 14% misinterpretation of data, and 1% actual aliens.
That’s not to say it’s a bad formula. The X-Files was wildly successful and that formula rocked for setting atmosphere and that is what this film also does. If setting up creepy situations is your goal this film could be your YouTube instructional video. The problem is when it actually came time for something to happen the creepy atmosphere stopped off at the Hum Drum Truck Stop and took a little snooze in the back seat of its car.
The story is pretty much the love child of an episode of Supernatural mated with Scooby Doo (image courtesy of the cartoon t shirt category). I have to admit serious disappointment in the level of creativity displayed here. The story was every bad horror/ghost cliche done in a dead boring order. Why not have the Ouija board be a key to a portal to the Lost City of R’Lyeh and the kids have to wander around trying to avoid Cthulu and his minions. Of course at that point the movie would have been a rip off of Hellraiser II but honestly it would have been a lot more fun. How about the Ouija board is connected to the ghost of a girl killed by a serial killer and she is trying to give them clues to who it is before he kills off half the local high school? The police are desperate to find him but no one believes the kids except for one desperate cop out for revenge for his daughters death (in this case played by James Woods). Either of these stories would have been better than the formulaic dross this film is comprised of and I just thought of them while sitting here at my desk.
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Ouija Review Part 2
There is one thing about this film that I love and that is it shows that once in a while Hollywood can learn a lesson. You see this is another Hasbro property and after they massive success they had with the Tranformers series they clearly thought that the nostalgia of their toys and games is what sold that Micheal Bay brain drain and so they sank a ton of money into Battleship, the worst navel film since the Final Countdown. When their nine figure exxxxxxxxxxxxxxtravaganza went on to suck and die they must have had a “What the hell are we doing??” moment and took the budget for their huge horror release Ouija down from a ridiculous $100,000,000 budget to a much more reasonable teenage slasher $15,000,000. Net result: a decent box office return on a reasonable property. Let’s hope they keep this lesson in mind when it comes time to do the Candyland movie. (Image courtesy of the Transfomers t shirt category)
But the warm feeling I get from that lesson does not diminish the issues with this film. Characters in films are appealing when they act smart in the face of difficulty. These kids were freaking idiots. A key plot point was in order to appease the ghost they twice had to sneak into a basement and find the corpse of a girl and either free or burn it. At no point did any of them think to call the police and say something like “Um, we think there’s a human corpse in the basement over here. Could you like send over the coroner and take care of it?” Nope instead let’s load up on flashlights Goonies style and creepy crawl into your impending deaths. Everyone keeps dying solo and so let’s all split up to expedite the killing. Of course beautiful early 20 year olds playing high school students (plus guys who more or less look and act like more like chicks) are at the top of my list of people I like to see die horribly in horror films so by the end of this movie I was seriously rooting for the ghost.
Of course it should go without saying putting a PG-13 stamp on a movie that claims to be horror is laughable in every sense of the word. PG-13 is the worst. In fact you can rearrange the letters in PG-13 and get it to spell suck.
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Ouija Review Part 3
The story. A girl (Shelly Hennig) plays around with a Ouija board by herself and kills herself. Her best friend Laine (Olivia Cooke), Laine’s sister Sarah (Ana Coto), and three other Red Shirts (Daren Kagasoff, Bianca Santos, Doughlas Smith) try to use the board to contact Debbie but instead contact the ghost that killed her. The kids start dropping off one by one like participants in a game of musical chairs and it’s up to Laine to figure out what is going on. At this point just switch over to any vengeful spirit episode of Supernatural and substitute two hot sisters for the two hot brothers and you are good to go. Turns out the last occupant in the house was a medium who had two daughters and killed one of them while talking to spirits and the other daughter killed the mother and the girl is buried in the basement and they need to release the spirit and then they need to burn the body Supernatural style and…
I’m sorry did I fall asleep there? Looks like there is a limit to how many cliches I can recount in a day before falling into a coma. So how about this movie you ask? Meh. The atmosphere stuff works really well and if being startled by a door shutting and showing you a creepy man/boy who wasn’t there a second ago (it was just one of the boyfriends) gets your blood pumping you won’t regret it. However if you are looking for either an original story or a body count movie this will bore the crap out of you. Acting wasn’t bad nor were the special effects given the budget (I can literally see the PA in my mind they had thumping on walls and floors). However the formulaic nature of the film and the gore smothering PG-13 rating will leave you with nothing to grab onto. See it if there is nothing else good on but honestly I’d rather have seen John Wick a second time. 2 of 5 Phasers.
Looks like kind of a lame movie weekend honestly. I have a couple of cultural commentary blog I have been thinking about so maybe I will do those this weekend. I suppose I should go see Box Trolls and am excited about Nightcrawler so I will have something for you this weekend. Thanks for reading.
the Infamous Dave Inman
(BTW the image is actually a t-shirt we have in the horror movie t-shirts category. Even I get surprised by what we have sometimes).
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John Wick Review Part 1
The story of a man and his dog.
I have decided I want to be kinder in my thoughts towards Keanu Reeves. Sure it’s easy to jump on the “His current movies suck” bandwagon but I read in interview with him where he wished he got better roles and people liked working with him more and suddenly I was struck by the realization that he actually has provided me (and the movie world in general) with a ton of kind of awesome entertainment. Obviously the Matrix is a no brainer and in spite of the Wachowski siblings taking a left turn into the Dark Valley of Unplanned, Unnecessary, and Ungood Sequels he did an admirable job with the role he was given. For all everyone laughs at Point Break that was more about the live action stage play. Devil’s Advocate was great, as was Constantine and it’s easy to forget Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Speed set the barometer for dumb fun action adventure. I even liked Johnny Mnemonic once I got over how badly they translated the story and found a lot of things to like in 47 Ronin. I won’t go so far as to say I’m a fan but honestly I’m appreciative of the many hours of entertainment Keanu has given me.
So what about John Wick? Honestly shockingly good. Keanu managed to pull the cold heartless killer off well and the action made this movie kind of rock. This is a movie that plays out like a video game and that video game happens to be Max Payne. Lots of guns, lots of shooting, and the story of a grizzled burnt out killer of men trying to get revenge for…well more on that later. 
Most of the action scenes were so Max Payne-like that I kept expecting to see a Bullet Time meter in one corner of the screen (Bullet Bill image courtesy of the video game t shirt category). This is definitely one of those movies that when they come out with the special DvD release one of the special features will be a body counter that hits three digits.
However I am going to rail against the whole name a movie out of some jackass no one has ever heard of thing. This failed miserably in Jack Reacher. It failed again in Jack Ryan. Does Hollywood think 3rd times the charm? At least those two had some kind of literature tie in and popularity but I am no pop culture slouch and I couldn’t have told you who those two were to save my life. Making up someone entirely new and then expecting us to flock to the theaters becuase the name sounds vaguely like a sexual innuendo is asinine. Also why is it all these name as title movies have to have a one syllable name starting with a J? I don’t see Hollywood lining up to do an action movie called Barnabas Grossweiner.
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